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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25200064">blue moon</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/loamvessel/pseuds/loamvessel'>loamvessel</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dead To Me (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F, aka bucking the trend of gay cowboy culture, but the muse is fickle sometimes, cowboy/rancher etc au, trying to be more critical about how i approach the american west</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 09:48:36</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>592</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25200064</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/loamvessel/pseuds/loamvessel</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>At sixteen, Jen Harding had been all anyone could want, with her clear eyes and the sandy hair, her legs long like a model’s in blue jeans. She’d been the one everyone said was going somewhere. Instead she married a rancher’s son and settled down. Her husband’s car had turned over on the road one December night, and now it was just her and the two boys, Charlie, the oldest one, who rode broncos on the rodeo circuit, and the little one, not tough enough to be able to win fights on The Hill when the time came, but who was good with horses. Judy was still in Montana, too, but no one had ever thought Judy was going anywhere.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Judy Hale/Jen Harding</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>36</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>blue moon</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I’ve been reading a lot of Maile Meloy and was struck by how many parallels there were between her writing and Dead to Me (death in freak vehicle accidents, lawyers, hippies, spousal infidelity and beautiful blonde women) but set against a radically different background. Hence this short little one shot.</p><p>Apologies to anyone actually from Montana.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She went with Steve to buy the horse from Jen Harding. Steve was a court lawyer from Missoula, tall and blue eyed with an easy mercurial charm. He knew nothing about horses, but he’d never admit that to a man, so he’d brought Judy because she was local. </p><p>At sixteen, Jen Harding had been all anyone could want, with her clear eyes and the sandy hair, her legs long like a model’s in blue jeans. She’d been the one everyone said was going somewhere. Instead she married a rancher’s son and settled down. Her husband’s car had turned over on the road one December night, and now it was just her and the two boys, Charlie, the oldest one, who rode broncos on the rodeo circuit, and the little one, not tough enough to be able to win fights on The Hill when the time came, but who was good with horses. Judy was still in Montana, too, but no one had ever thought Judy was going anywhere.</p><p>Jen Harding poured them all coffee. She looked tired and grey, but Judy thought she was still as pretty as she had been in high school when she’d worn a red and yellow skirt and cheered at the football games. The horse was a piebald filly with straight legs that augured well for racing. They bought, and Jen Harding shook both their hands. Her hand was dry and smooth, and Judy thought she felt something pass between them, something that she hadn’t seen between Jen and Steve. </p><p>Afterwards Jen Harding would stop to talk to her when they saw each other in town. That made her happy, happier for some reason than it had when she started going around on Steve’s arm and everyone looked at her like they couldn’t believe it. In the summer she would sometimes drive up to Jen’s big ranch house, and they’d smoke a joint and sit out on the porch. Jen wants to sell the ranch—she’s the one who knew more about livestock, but with Ted gone the place makes her sad. She shrugs when Judy asks her where she’ll go. Maybe just in town, who knows? Or maybe finally out of Montana. </p><p>Jen was smart in school, but she’s been out of work too long to get a job that isn’t waitress. She thinks her best bet is marrying again, or maybe going back to college. Something about this makes Judy sad, even when Jen falls asleep with her head on Judy’s shoulder and she can smell Jen’s shampoo. </p><p>Judy’s never had an affair. She’s a good girl, the kind everyone says you should marry, even if she turned hippie in her twenties and lost her virginity in a car at the end of a dirt road, and cowboys care about that kind of thing. But when Jen Harding kisses her one night on the porch in August, Judy kisses her back, heart pounding in her chest. And when she takes her hand and walks her to the big ranch bedroom, Judy takes off her shirt and kisses the white scars on Jen’s breasts—the ones that mean she won’t get cancer like her mother—and opens her legs so that Jen can slip one, then two fingers inside. And when she asks Judy if they’ll do this again, she doesn’t say no. She just walks to her car and smiles to herself as she drives back to Steve’s and watches the dust rise in the path of her headlights like something out of a dream.</p>
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